Lawndale

History

Native Americans of the Tongva tribe lived in the area. From the 1780s onward, the area that is now Lawndale was part of the Rancho Sausal Redondo, a land grant given by the Spanish colonial government that includes much of what is now the South Bayshore region. In 1905, Charles B. Hopper first subdivided the area and named it after the Chicago neighborhood of the same name. Lots sold slowly and different promotions were tried, such as promoting Lawndale as a chicken raising area. The first railway to run through Lawndale was the Inglewood Division of the Redondo Railway which would later become part of the Pacific Electric "Red Car" system. It ran down the middle of Railway Avenue (now Hawthorne Boulevard) until 1933. In 1927, the Santa Fe railroad arrived. After World War II, the immense demand for housing from returning veterans and California newcomers resulted in Lawndale's formation as a bedroom community. On December 28, 1959, it was incorporated as a city. Starting in the 1970s, Lawndale's relatively low housing prices but more desirable location relative to its neighboring cities attracted absentee landlords and a substantial portion of its residents increasingly became renters. For a time in the 1980s, with a new cycle of expansion of the defense industry nearby, many young people who wished to live in the Beach Cities found that they simply could not afford to do so, and settled in less glamorous inland cities such as Lawndale. But with the contraction of this industry after the Cold War, Lawndale reverted to its previous pattern. It has attempted to attract more owner–residents, as well as tourists, with the 2003 completion of the "Beautify Lawndale" urban renewal project along the city's stretch of Hawthorne Boulevard (State Route 107), a major South…

Geography

According to the United States Census Bureau, the city has a total area of , all land. The weather is warm all year long. In the winter, there are moderate rains. Because of the formation of the Palos Verdes Peninsula and its proximity to the beach, the city gets effects of the marine layer on almost identical, if not slightly lower, levels of nearby beach cities such as Manhattan Beach and El Segundo.

Race & ethnicity

Most-observed species

• Bladder kelp

  Macrocystis pyrifera (L.) C.Agardh · Phaeophyceae
  127,790
• House Finch

  Haemorhous mexicanus (P.L.Statius Müller, 1776) · Aves
  39,347
• American Crow

  Corvus brachyrhynchos C.L.Brehm, 1822 · Aves
  36,823
• Black Phoebe

  Sayornis nigricans (Swainson, 1827) · Aves
  36,778
• Allen's Hummingbird

  Selasphorus sasin (R.Lesson, 1829) · Aves
  31,061
• Western Gull

  Larus occidentalis Audubon, 1839 · Aves
  30,975
• Mourning Dove

  Zenaida macroura (Linnaeus, 1758) · Aves
  27,348
• Mallard

  Anas platyrhynchos Linnaeus, 1758 · Aves
  25,129

Most recent

• M 2.94 — 2026-09-17
  4 km SSE of Compton, CA
• M 2.56 — 2026-09-13
  27 km SSE of Malibu, CA
• M 2.65 — 2026-09-12
  4 km E of Lennox, CA
• M 3.31 — 2026-09-12
  26 km ESE of Avalon, CA
• M 2.95 — 2026-09-12
  26 km ESE of Avalon, CA
• M 2.54 — 2026-09-12
  26 km ESE of Avalon, CA